The comeback of nature to the uncertain landscapes. Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord

Abstract

We propose to examine uncertain places and landscapes in a way that allows for the understanding of the main characteristics present in nowadays territorial realities. What if we were to look at these unattended landscapes otherwise? Would not they become the blank pages we are in need of? Is it not true that only in the void can the garden reality be, as a result of filling one “non-site”, capable of hosting a whole new spirit? The work of the French gardener G. Clément, The Third Landscape and Le jardin en movement. De la vallée au jardin planétaire, recognizes these spaces and pursues the task to contemplate and redraw them under its own landscape regard. In order to review uncertain landscapes we will approach decline and uncertainty in the work of the architect Peter Latz. Although it has already been broadly studied, due to his challenge and dialogue towards landscape, the investigation will take on the experience of Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord, a fascinating landscape shaped by the fragments and leftovers of a desolate industrial territory which, nonetheless, possesses a great evoking capacity. Territory recovery possibilities are conceived from the garden perspective, from the spontaneous and wild vegetation growing that rejects being an imitation or figurative replica of the natural landscape, outlining the influence performed by this project on the subsequent Third Landscape theories.